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Advertising In Disguise On Social Media

Having a seasonal business makes you adaptable, flexible, and ready for change. Seasonal business owners have the luxury of many advantages that non-seasonal businesses lack. When you’re in season, business is hot. You know that your profits will spike, and you can anticipate the increase in hiring and working that will need to take place. Seasonal businesses are fortunate to have a rest period when their season is over. They also have the advantage of being able to market directly leveraging the season to their advantage. On the flip side, however, is that for seasonal businesses it can get very busy or hectic during the hot season. It can be stressful and often difficult to accurately anticipate the amount of extra employees, products, and time that will be necessary to fill the extra need. Being too cautious can result in over-hiring, while being too careless can result in not stocking up enough inventory. One of the biggest challenges for seasonal businesses is to be able to market once the holidays are over. Fortunately, there are a set of strategies which, if applied effectively, can help your business succeed in the off-season. Here are a few things that your CMO needs to know in order to be effective in the off-season and prepare your business for the hot season.

1. Focus on your customers

One of the biggest fears of businesses is that they wont be able to keep up their profits in the off-season. Once the holidays pass, so do a solid chunk of customers and revenue for many businesses. However, direct sales and revenue aren’t the only ways that your company can benefit in the off-season. When the holidays are over, rather than worrying about finding other attractive ways to entice your customers, focus on your brand. You should seek customer reviews, and reward your customers for reviewing your products and services. By capturing their insights and testimonials while they are still relevant, you will have more accurate reviews than if you were to wait too long after the holidays have passed. Use this period of time to gather information and feedback, so that next holiday season you can be properly equipped. Also, the off-season is a great time to build rapport with customers. When it’s the holiday season and things are busy, customers are too occupied to engage with your company; they are busy buying. The off-season presents a unique opportunity because things are more quiet. Use this to your advantage by gathering information and positioning yourself in the best way possible for next season. Carlos Garay CEO from a popular Vape Pens company, SOURCEvapes, mentioned that,

During the off-season, you want customers to miss you. Leverage customer reviews not only for the benefit of learning, but also for marketing. Build your brand by releasing and broadcasting customer reviews for prospective customers to see. Take advantage of website pages, blog posts, social media updates, and email marketing. These will help you develop and your grow audience and customer base. Also, interactive content is now more powerful than ever.

In addition to merely writing about your company, see if you can get customers to post a video or image about your product. This will seem more interesting to viewers and will help build your brand.

2. Focus on Content Marketing

Some sporting teams saw an increase of only 2% in the off-season. Others saw 10% - which they attributed largely to their marketing efforts. To take advantage of the off-season, your CMO should check on any problems their company site had with taking orders or anything marketing related. When things are busy, it's difficult to find the time to investigate problems with your website. During the off-season is when you can clean through your systems and make sure that everything is running smoothly. CEO from Lainaaege.fi mentioned that, “Marketing in the off-season is key. Many businesses only focus on marketing when the market is hot – but this hurts them in the long run.” Whether or not your business is in season, it is incredibly important to market. Take advantage of the time of year by making the marketing campaign specific to the season.

3. Stay engaged with your clients

Stay social, no matter what month it is. Keep up the social media posts, keep up the email blasts, and don’t fade away. If you fade from your customers’ consciousness in the off-season then they won’t remember you in the holiday season either. Remember to send updates, post videos, and continue establishing warm contact with your customers so that you will be top of mind when the holiday season rolls around again.